I’m getting a lot of ‘but my car is more convenient’ arguments lately, and I’m struggling to convey why that doesn’t make sense.
Specifically how to explain to people that: Sure, if you are able to drive, and can afford it, and your city is designed to, and subsidizes making it easy to drive and park, then it’s convenient. But if everyone does it then it quickly becomes a tragedy of the commons situation.
I thought of one analogy that is: It would be ‘more convenient’ if I just threw my trash out the window, but if we all started doing that then we’d quickly end up in a mess.
But I feel like that doesn’t quite get at the essence of it. Any other ideas?
Flip it - instead of “your convenience is inconveniencing the others”, frame it as “the others’ convenience is inconveniencing you”. It’s the same thing, but people accept the later better.
Specially because IMO the focus should not be on dictating individual actions, but gathering collective support for political decisions.